A blog about a busy mom who homeschools her four children, juggles activities and housework, and still manages to find quality time to be a family.

Saturday, December 20, 2008

Snowy Days

We have had something of a snowstorm the past two days, and we are loving it! What could be better, five days before Christmas, than to have the yard covered in snow, mittens drying on the radiators, kids with pink, pink cheeks, and to take frosty walks to see the geese on the pond? For those of you unfamiliar with the East End of Long Island, we don't see very much snow, even less than New York City, usually. The effect of being surrounded by all this water (especially here, where the island forks into the two arms; we have the bay as well as the Atlantic and the Sound within 20 miles of each other...) means that while the western part of the island often gets plenty of snowfall, it usually doesn't get cold enough for us to have snow, or it blows off onto the ocean or some such disappointing nonsense. So any time there's snow in the forecast, we wait breathlessly to see what we'll get, and we're often disappointed.

But yesterday, for our anniversary no less, it started snowing in the late morning and continued through the afternoon. We had perhaps four or five inches, and Matt and I talked of walking downtown to our anniversary dinner of Greek food-- we thought it would be fun to walk a mile together in the snow, holding hands and talking, like when we were in college again--but then, unfortunately, it changed to rain and we had no desire to walk in that, so we just took the car instead. I put on a brave face to the kids, but inside I was upset about the rain--I pictured all the beautiful snow melting away in the night and waking up to the bare trees and brown and gray landscape that is the worst part of winter to almost everyone.

Luckily, when we woke this morning, and indeed, all day long, tiny flakes were flying through the air, a great many of them most of the time. I don't think we have six inches, but still, the kids were thrilled to play in it, and it has been lovely doing our Christmassy things like wrapping gifts and baking, baking, baking with the snow flying. When we shoveled we saw the evidence of last night's rain--about an inch of the snow had turned to ice--but what was on top was lovely and powdery, and under the ice layer is too. And the good thing is that the ice layer will probably make the snow stick around longer, so that makes me happy! Matt has been breaking his back in the kitchen today, making cookies and more cookies to bring to the office and to pack up to mail to family...and yes, we know they won't get them before Christmas, and we are very bad for procrastinating. Sorry about that. As I've posted already, we have had a hard time this year getting into the whole holiday rush, and we had several gifts to find and now we have another thing to do so the packages won't go out till Monday. These relatives will just have a nice treat after Christmas, and out gifts won't get lost in the shuffle. Put a positive spin on things. Anyway, here's hoping that the loveliness will last as long as possible, because I really do love snow!

--Jen

The kids built a tiny snowman--this was taken early in the afternoon when there wasn't really enough snow...Now he is mostly buried in the yard; you can see the hat and scarf sticking out at the top.

Collin's only request for where we go next is that there is snow! And since we got un-offical word that he is in at LIJMC, he'll be thrilled to see the snow in your pictures! And to be honest, I'm ready for a some snow too!

On another note, everytime LI comes up and we talk about moving there, he pipes up with "My friends are in Long Island." He can't always remember their names, but he knows his friends are in Long Island! LOL!

About Me

I am a homeschooling mom of four gorgeous kids, trying to enjoy every minute of time we have together--and keep my sanity intact at the same time! I am married to a brilliant, wonderful man who has been my best friend since we first met. I feel lucky to be where I am.

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